ACLU Charges South Dakota County Blocking Native Americans from Holding Public Office

The American Civil Liberties Union is suing Charles Mix County for violating the voting rights of American Indians. The federal lawsuit, filed Thursday in Sioux Falls, alleges that the county commission deliberately created election districts to divide the Indian population. "There has never been an Indian elected to the Charles Mix County Commission," ACLU attorney Bryan Sells of Atlanta said Thursday. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of four members of the Yankton Sioux Tribe who live in the county. One of them, Evelyn Blackmoon, issued a written statement through the ACLU, saying: "We have been without a voice on the commission for too long. This is an effort to change that." The Rapid City Journal was unable to reach any of those plaintiffs Thursday evening. The Journal also was unable to reach Charles Mix County officials, who were in Pierre on Thursday. Charles Mix County has three county commission districts. Sells also said the ACLU warned the county commissioners in 2001 that state law required them to redraw districts based on the 2000 Census to make them more equal in population. "They didn't do that," Sells said. He called the districts "a blatant violation of the one-person, one-vote principle." [more] and [more]